Unacademy to use its funding for upskilling and job search market

Learning platform Unacademy on Monday announced it has raised USD 440 million in a funding round led by Temasek, with super pro-rata participation from General Atlantic, Tiger Global, and Softbank Vision Fund.

The latest fundraise takes the valuation of Unacademy Group to USD 3.44 billion, it said in a statement.

The Series H funding round also witnessed participation from Aroa Ventures, the family office of OYO Founder Ritesh Agarwal, and Deepinder Goyal, Co-Founder and CEO at Zomato.

Some angel investors of Unacademy have exited in this round, it said.

Over the last 18 months, the valuation of the Unacademy Group has risen almost 10X, one of the fastest growth rates witnessed by a mid-stage consumer internet startup in India, the statement said.

The latest round follows one in January 2021 when Tiger Global, Dragoneer Investment Group, Steadview Capital and General Atlantic doubled down on their earlier investments through a secondary transaction, it was stated.

The present funding comes within a year of the startup raising an undisclosed amount in November 2020, which valued the company at $2 billion. Unacademy had also raised $150 million in September 2020, at a valuation of $1.45 billion, which marked its entry into India’s coveted unicorn club.

Unacademy plans to use the funding to scale its new lines of business as it looks to double down and scale in its presence in the upskilling and job search market.

“There are three major products that we will build and scale (or continue scaling) - Unacademy, helping people crack life-changing exams; Relevel, giving people a path to get their dream job irrespective of their educational background and Graphy, empowering creators to build their online businesses to sell digital goods including NFTs," said Gaurav Munjal, founder, Unacademy on micro-blogging website Twitter while announcing the fundraise.

Last week, Unacademy also announced the launch of Teacher Stock Options (TSOPs) for all educators on its platform. Through the initiative, Unacademy educators will be eligible for fully vested stock grants on completion of three, four and five years with Unacademy respectively.

“On Day 1 we already have more than 300 educators eligible for the grant which they will get immediately. Over the next few years we will give grants of over $40 million to our educators," Munjal tweeted.